


The Chaos Collective - Cartoon Physics

by Gonna_Getcha_Boy



Category: Furry - Fandom, Juicedoesthings, OCs - Fandom, cartoon - Fandom
Genre: Check out the creator, Juicedoesthings - Freeform, OCs - Freeform, Shout out to the actual Juice who gave me permission to write about these characters, Sonas, This is just a self indulgent project, Trying out new ideas and themes and character types, cartoon au
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-13
Updated: 2020-11-19
Packaged: 2021-03-09 21:48:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,127
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27523336
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gonna_Getcha_Boy/pseuds/Gonna_Getcha_Boy
Summary: Four zany, cartoon characters in a less then zany and cartoony world. From Cav, the creative and spunky to River, the mysterious and sturdy. Happy as they were, their crazy antics fell on deaf ears most days due to their more then normal behavior.When those four wish for something different, and get thrust into a world seemingly made for the artistic and kooky and undeniably cartoony, how soon will it be till they learn that not all is what it seems?
Relationships: No Romantic Relationship(s)
Kudos: 10





	1. A Normal Day

**Author's Note:**

> Go check out the creators of these funky few from their home base at https://juicedoesthings.tumblr.com/

The sun slowly rose on a new day, the birds already rising from the trees in small droves, chirping and pipping away incessantly. The trees were already turning a crisp orange color, making an almost picturesque landscaping shot, complimented by yet another gorgeous rising sun. Critters of all sorts scurried about, getting to work on yet another day of their lives, not without making quite the chatter among themselves

In such a great, big forest, there usually wouldn't have been anything or anyone to jolt awake. But nestled in the forest with only a faded, dirt road leading up to it was a large house. A nice one at that. Four bedrooms, two floors, and nicely tucked away from anything else for miles around. A grand house, yes, but a fairly normal one at that. It looked like the classic family get-away house that one would go to for spring break, only to be murdered by some horror villain with the rest of your cliché-filled posse.

But no, it was the occupants of this house that made it oh so special. For inside, insane as it may sound...Were cartoon characters. Beings that were anything but normal and run-of-the-mill. And one of them rose with sun, not of his own violation, of course.

The south part of this manor held the bedrooms, one of which held a rather large fish tank instead of a bed, and this fish tank held within a most unusual creature.

Juice the red, one-eyed Axolotl snored peacefully, curled up in the corner on top of a rock hardly larger then himself(though that wasn't such a feat to begin with). Rounded around the edges and standing at three feet tall, Juice was curious creature to say the least. His frilly gills on either side of his head, one big eye, a crazy set of chompers, and his short stature tied together to make a most amusing salamander man. He was currently wearing a puffy sweatshirt the same shade of red as the rest of him, the shirt having three cursive 'Z's plastered on the front, and perched on his head was an old sleeping cap, the bobble floating adrift in the water. A simple, cartoony creature at heart, Juice was content to sleep on that rock, a large heating lamp blazing into the tank keeping him nice and warm at all times, something he was thankful for considering the chill that ran through the air nowadays. Juice could have easily slept there forever, but destiny said otherwise.

Destiny being his housemates, that is.

"Cav!" A voice barked as a series of rapid knocks awoke the salamander, "you're not sleeping through your chores, not this time!"

Juice jolted awake most unpleasantly, which was already a sour way to start your morning, but definitely not helped by the fact that 'jolting' meant you flailed uselessly in the water. He was barely able to catch what his housemate said before loud footsteps were already walking away from his door. The Axolotl glared through the blurred glass out at the door before breaching, treading water as he blinked his single eye, still trying to wake up so suddenly. It wasn't time to pay rent...He was caught up on his comic deadlines...He had even helped do the dishes after movie night...So why the sudden wake up call?

Smacking his mouth absently, Juice leaned on the side of his tank, letting his eye shut until he felt something damp and limp against his arm. Looking over, there were almost a dozen, drenched sticky notes floating on the top of the water. Furrowing his single brow, Juice reached up and felt around. There was even one stuck to his sleeping cap. 'Bubby Sans Undertale???' was scrawled, barely legible considering the ink had run from the water overnight. Right, comic ideas came at the weirdest times, and if that meant scrawling it down on a sticky note and slapping it to the edge of the tank before drifting to the bottom, already passed out, then so be it.

Looking around, Juice grabbed his pencil, which was also floating in the water and shook it out, grabbing another sticky note from a tall desk next to the tank. On it he quickly wrote ' ~~Buy~~ Invent waterproof paper?' before slapping it on the edge of the tank. He watched as it flittered from the tank edge into the water, joining the rest.

"I can't win here." Juice muttered to himself before heaving himself over the edge of the tank, planting his feet on the heighted staircase that helped him safely reach the floor, shaking the water from his external gills like a dog. Still trying to remember what day it had to be to get his housemates in such a fuss, Juice threw open his closet. It was full of identical sweatshirts of the same puffy, red caliber. He narrowed his eye, looking through them meticulously before grabbing the right-most one and dusting it off. Taking off his sopping wet sleep-sweatshirt, Juice tossed it back into the tank, where it gathered among the artist's supplies at the top. Juice pulled on a new, blank red sweatshirt before turning to what was almost a pedestal of sorts. In any case, it had a small pillow on top, which housed a solid red crown which gleamed in the morning light through the open window. Scooping the crown from its revered spot, Juice whipped off his sleeping cap, which joined his sweatshirt, and placed the crown on its rightful spot. 

Turning to check his mirror, which was only a foot off the ground and three feet tall, Juice grinned toothily at himself off before turning and walking out the door.

Despite how early it was, the three other bedroom doors were already open, and a quick glance showed that they were empty. Up at the crack of dawn and he was _still_ late? _How?_ Walking down the hallway, Juice stretched his arms above his round head. Up early, might be a good chance to get a jump on the deadlines this time around. Cav the Axolotl was a comic artist('Juice' being a stage name) and a damn good one at that. Having amassed a modest following on social media via original content and creating that from popular topics, he quickly became popular amongst a small crowd. Yet he still worked his hardest to keep that crowd pleased.

"Morning, Cav." Having passed down the bedroom hallway, Juice turned to his left into the living room, where one of his dear old housemates was lounged on the couch, looking as tired as Juice himself. Balancing the blade of a knife on the tip of one of his fingers was Bubby. To put it as simple as possibly, Bubby was a porcelain clown doll. Those old pantomime clowns? With the white outfit and two, big black buttons on the front with black and white makeup? That was Bubby. Though he dressed in greens and yellows, with a pointed hat balanced on his neatly parted black hair. Whether it be from him being a possessed doll or generally being in a fair mood most of the time, Bubby always had a big old, toothy grin. But considering how even when he slept or cried or raged, he still grinned, it was safe to say it was the former. The clown tossed the knife in the air before catching it by the handle, "You look like hell. How'd you sleep?" He asked as Juice waddled over and flopped down on the couch as well.

"Mrmftelmm."

"Sorry, didn't catch that?"

Juice raised his head so that his mouth wasn't pressed against the cushions. "Slept bad. My lamp kept flickering all night. And I kept having ideas, which, yay! I get to pay the bills! But also, couldn't sleep because of it." Juice narrowed his eye as Bubby let out a snicker, "you shouldn't be talking much. You could pack the house up in the bags under your eyes."

Bubby rubbed his pale cheeks with a shrug and a grin, "My power kept buzzing out too. My alarm clock kept going off randomly. I swear it started hopping in place by midnight. Honestly though, don't know why I need an alarm clock when we've got River's booming voice." he said, getting a chuckle out of Juice.

As they talked, they heard the front door open, followed by the sound of something heavy being dragged across the ground.

Juice suddenly groaned, "Oh Jesus I just remembered...Cleaning Day?" he asked, wishing for it not to be true, even as Bubby somberly nodded his head, the bell on top of his hat jangling away as he did so.

"We do this every year, Juice. Don't act so surprised." The voice belonging to today's alarm clock said as the dragging suddenly stopped and River turned the corner. River the Opossum was the biggest and strongest of the four who lived under the manor's roof. The other three looked up to him, literally, River was around seven feet tall to Juice's knowledge. Much like Juice, River didn't wear pants, the two never felt like they needed to, them being walking, talking animals after all. The sleeves on River's hoodie were rolled up to the elbows, but he hadn't gotten rid of the blanket-like shawl he kept wrapped around him at most times. His pink, ringed tail swayed from side to side, yet he was fairly good at making sure not to knock anything over. It wasn't just because of his ability to switch to a tense tone, or his general, large mass that was vaguely intimidating, but the fact that, no matter how hard the others tired to figure out, there was always just _something_ off about the strange opossum. "I already told Zeoia this so I'll tell you both now...We're gonna try to tackle the attic today."

The Axolotl and Clown both let out a whimpered groan, knocking their heads against each other on the couch as they slumped, ready to accept defeat already. The attic of the manor had been something the housemates had purposefully neglected to go through since they moved in. It was always full of things that didn't belong to any of them. And any time they went up to try and clean it out, there seemed to be _more_ boxed debris then there was last time, despite the fact that no one ever goes up there. 

"Look, it's gonna cave us in eventually if we don't move the shit outta there." River said, rolling his yellow eyes, "we have to go shopping soon anyways. Might as well sell off a bunch of old junk on the way." He added with a shrug, "now come on, Zeoia's already out in the yard. Juice, how about you go help her for now and me and Bubby'll start in here?" River suggested, much to Juice's distaste. Luckily, Zeoia was more then fun to be around, so at least it wouldn't be so miserable.

"This is the thanks I get for being the funniest member in this house." Juice tossed his arms up, hopping off the couch and making his way to the door. The dragging noises, as it turned out, was River pulling in the cleaning supplies from outside, like a full bucket of water and several mops and bottles of soap. Juice retracted his arms into his hoodie against the chill breeze outside. Fall weather was never unpleasant, but it always got brisk a bit too early around here.

They had a beautiful place to live, no doubt. The trees, already turning warmer colors before their eyes, dropped leaves all around, the wind blowing them around. The yard was wide enough, a car parked on the grass between the trees, ready to turn onto the dirt road when they needed to go get food and supplies.

"How'd you sleep?" A voice as brisk as the wind called from somewhere to the side of Juice. Zeoia floated several feet off the ground, holding a rank which she dragged across the ground, pushing and pulling the leaves into small piles around the lawn. Zeoia was...It was hard to say, really. She always gave a smile and a shrug whenever the others asked _what_ she was, so they had just started to assume she was some kind of shadow creature or an alien. Her skin was pitch black, and dotted around her skin were bioluminescent speckles that gleamed under the right light. Zeoia's eyes were a foggy, pink color, a contrast from the rest of her for sure. The pair of antenna that poked from her mop of white hair twitched in the breeze, perking up when she saw her friend. "You still look pretty tired..."

"Considering it's like, 5 am, I think I have the right." Juice chuckled through a yawn, scratching his chest as he looked up at Zeoia as she put down her rake and floated off to grab a second one that was leaning against the house. She and Juice were fairly the same in terms of height and overall size, but she floated around nearly all the time, cancelling out whatever feeling of short-solidarity Juice would have felt. Not that being short was a problem, no, the life of a small, round Axolotl was easy-going when your friends could easily fit you in their pockets. "River tell you about his plans with the attic?"

"Yeah... Can't say I'm too excited to dig through that treasure trove. It looks like the warehouse from Indiana Jones up there." Zeo said, handing Juice a rake, the handle of which had been sawed in half to make it easier to use. "But we've put that off way too much. There could be evidence for cold case files up there, for all we know. Regardless, are you excited to go into town? Have any errands to run?"

"Need more sticky notes." Juice said, scraping his rakes against the leaves to pull them into Zeoia's pile. Going into town was certainly an experience every time. Crazy creatures like them weren't exactly considered an anomaly, there were a fair few everywhere you went. But that didn't stop people from acting awkward around such folk, not bothering to try and understand what they were saying when they cracked a wacky joke or did a silly, physical stunt. Being a cartoon as such in a more then real world was always tough. Your art and hard work wouldn't get respect because of what you were. So, 'excited' wasn't really the right word. "New lightbulbs too. My heat lamp is running on fumes."

And so they worked, talking all the while. No matter what grueling chore or boring task awaited you, it always felt a bit more bearable when you had friends to experience it with. Not one of them would ever dream of parting from the others, because sometimes it felt like their friends were all they had. Juice and Zeoia ranked the lawn, pulled the weeds, and swept the pathway from the road to the house, Zeoia had even teleported up to the roof to clean out the gutter. On the inside, Bubby and River scrubbed the floors and walls, cleaned out the fridge(could have sworn the old Chinese food in the back wriggled), and took the liberty of cleaning out everyone's rooms. 

Soon enough, armed with face masks, garbage bags, and a large baseball bat in case something started moving too suddenly, the four creatures made their way upstairs. The Axolotl, Clown, and Possum watched as Zeoia floated up towards the ceiling in the hallway, unhooking the latch for the attic. She folded the ladder downwards, taking the first step and floating up through the door. The others paused as Zeoia vanished from view. "It's good!...I think." She chirped from up through the latch.

The three on the ground exchanged nervous glances before lining up and scrambling up the ladder. Bubby grabbed Juice by the back of his sweatshirt for a bit of extra help. The attic was just as cryptic and spooky as always. Boxes piled all the way up to the slanted ceiling, unidentifiable objects littered the floor and hung from the ceiling. "I thought no one lived here before us." Bubby asked, tapping away a hanging plane with the blade of his knife. "The hell is all this shit?"

"If we find...A person living up here...I'm jumping out the window." River muttered, his tail curling up against his back as he nudged through the clutter, trying not to knock anything over.

"No use putting it off now." Juice said, hands on his hips as he looked around at the mountains of packed boxes, opening a trash bag and laying it over his shoulder as the group spilt up to the four corners of the room. Around an hour passed as the quartet purged the dusty attic, pulling ancient artifacts from the cardboard boxes. Juice found not one, not two, but three jack-in-the-boxes, all three went off when Zeoia came over to check, sending her spiraling back through the air in shock. River managed to to stumble across a box of glass spiders, almost sending him crashing back into the boxes when Juice came behind too suddenly. And Bubby found a Chinese Finger Trap that he tricked Zeoia into wearing for a solid five minutes before River came over to help free her.

Coughing out a mouthful of dust, Juice pulled out a large box from the corner, brushing the lid cautiously. By the looks of it, the box seemed older then the house itself. Holes were chewed through the bottom and as Juice lifted the top off, it felt like it was going to crumble in his hands. Peering inside, Juice's eye widened excitedly with an 'oooh'. "Hey guys, check this out!"

Zeoia was the first one over, hovering over Juice's head and looking into the box. "Is that a projector?" She asked as River and Bubby approached them. "Damn that looks old..." The shadow creature muttered as River and Bubby started to reach inside and pull it out. The spindly legs folded several times against themselves, and River was easily able to perch the bulky camera on his shoulders as Zeoia and Bubby set the stand up.

"No doubt we could make some money off of this. Pawn shops go crazy for this old junk." River said, brushing the dust off the lens as he attached the bulky camera to the legs, "but shit, who would leave all this behind? How did this even get here?"

"Isn't there supposed to be a movie-thing here?" Bubby asked, tapping the side of the projector as he narrowed his eyes. "The record, or whatever?"

"That's a gramophone, Bubby." Juice snorted as Bubby let out an 'ahh', he looked back into the box. "Ah-ha!" He exclaimed, reaching into the box and heaving out a large pair of movie tapes, as dusty and old as the projector itself. "We got the whole deal here!" He said triumphantly, hopping up onto a taller box so he could attach the tapes to the projector. River took one and examined both objects, trying to figure out how they worked together. Juice looked down at the tape, there were two words scrawled on the top of it, but the title was peeled and the ink was frayed. "C-A-R-T-O...Then it trails off, and then 'C-A', more blank space, and then 'G-E'."

"Wonder what kind of film it is." Bubby said, pulling up a box of fragile, expensive chinaware and sitting down on top of it as River took the next tape from Juice and strapped it in. "What'd you all think? Charlie Chaplin or one of those silent French dramas?"

"Or an old western, or a cheesy romance." Zeoia added on, dropping down to the ground and sitting on the floor, shortly joined by Juice, River stayed standing by the projector to make sure it didn't explode or anything. "You know, we _should_ still be cleaning."

"We can clean after the movie, shush!" Juice said, excitement growing as they all exclaimed eagerly as the projector flickered to life.

"Weird...Didn't know these things ran automatically." River muttered, having not hardly touched the mechanism before it sprang to life, flashing a light yellow screen on the wall. 

They were pleased to find that it was a cartoon! Something about a dastardly villain trying to destroy the world, classic stuff. None that they had ever seen though. It seemed to be from the 1920's or 30's. The tapes seemed to be some sort of conglomeration though, jumping between several episodes of the same old show, none of them recognized it in the least. Talking animals, bottomless pockets, and best of all? The insane cartoon physics. Running off a cliff, only to fall once you look down. The crazy fights where even a mouse could come up on top against a bear. The overall immunity these characters seemed to possess. It was fascinating to all four of them, being cartoon characters as well. But in a world like that, no limitation was seen. In a world like that, they didn’t even have to wait for plot convenience to call upon a crazy form of physics.

Juice couldn't help but slump at that. Cartoons like that went down in history among the greats. What if he didn't even mange to leave a scratch on the wall of history...?

"Uh, guys?"

The Axolotl was snapped from his daze as the projector started to hiss, the screen melting away as the machine started to pop and fizz. "Fuck, get a blanket or something! This thing is gonna burn the house down!" Bubby yelped, jumping to his feet as sparks and smoke started to emit from it. The projector started to bounce on its stilts, crashing into boxes and people alike. 

Zeoia grabbed it by the camera, trying to wrench it off. River kicked out the stilts as it started to shake their small friend to and fro. The spindly legs went flying, bu the camera itself was jerking around wildly. "Zeoia, let _go!_ " Bubby yelled, trying to snatch her from the air.

"I- _Can't!"_ She screamed, her arms wrapped around the projector still. River grabbed the camera as well, tearing it from her grasp. And for a tense, breath-holding moment, they stood and watched as the projector fell still the possum's arms.

Juice had just let out a sigh of relief when the projector sprung awake once more. The film coiled in the tapes shot from their holds, wrapping tightly around River, who squirmed and thrashed. "River, _no!_ " The Axolotl yelled, sprinting at his capture friend when the film rocketed out again and grabbing the other three. With a sharp tug, it pulled the four towards the projector like a magnet.

The projector fell to the ground, the fragile mechanisms splintering on the ground with no one around to catch it.

The attic was empty.


	2. Strange Circumstances

It was a few minutes before Juice realized he was awake.

His whole body jerked upwards, his eye flying open as he sat up all too suddenly, "Ugh..." Juice put a hand to his head, closing his eye against the bright light overhead...Bright...Light? Juice opened his eye again and was more then a little surprised to see that he was no longer in the attic, but was instead sprawled out in the middle of a lush forest. The trees were a beautiful green, as was the grass underfoot that cushioned him. This...Wasn't normal. It was _October,_ green foliage didn't exactly fit in there. What was happening? The last thing he remembered was the attic, and the projector had suddenly grabbed Juice and-

With another jolt of anxiety, Juice realized that he was alone. The other three were nowhere in sight. He stood up a little too fast, he stumbled back as the blood rushed to his head. As his blurred vision returned to focus, he realized that something was gripped tightly in his other hand. Frowning, he looked down to see a large, red pencil clenched in his fist. And this wasn't just big by Juice's little standards, this was big even for a full grown adult. Juice knew for a fact that he didn't have this before...Before whatever happened. He started to walk through the forest, trying to find _anything,_ a clue to where he was, to what had happened, to try to see if he could find his friends anywhere. "BUBBY! RIVER! ZEOIA! ANYONE THERE?!" He called out, shoving the pencil in his hoodie pocket when he felt something already weighing in the folds of his clothes. Tucking the pencil in his pocket, he pulled out the other object. It was one of the reels of film from the projector, but it looked brand new. With the letters no longer peeling, Juice could read the actual title, 'Cartoon Carnage'.

"Fun." Juice huffed, shoving the reel back in his pocket. Finally emerging from the woods, he held a hand up to block the sunlight from his heads. It was almost blindingly bright outside, and the colors seemed to be dulled down a bit, Juice's vibrant red image seemed a lot less colorful in...Wherever he was. Wherever that happened to be, the world certainly seemed a little... Off. The clouds were a little too swirly and grouped together, the trees just a little too green and shaped, and Juice could have _sworn_ he was seeing actual white lines in place of the wind.

"This day keeps getting weirder and weirder." Juice muttered to himself, trudging to the top of a picturesque hilltop. Narrowing his eye down at the scene below him, he let out a sigh of relief. A town was planted a ways away from him, about a mile walk. "Of all the times to have stubby little legs, it's when I gotta walk a whole lot." He grumbled, setting down the hill. But as he walked, a new sound floated up from where he had just walked from. Looking behind him, Juice was beyond shocked as a giant, spider-like creature emerged from behind the hill. It was about seven to eight feel tall and pitch black in color, it's long, spindly legs moving quickly as the creature made a beeline for Juice. " _What the-"_ Juice stumbled backwards, tripping over his own feet and starting to roll backwards, skidding in the dirt as the spider slammed a foot down on the space Juice had just been standing on. Scrambling to his feet, Juice sprinted through the fields as fast as his legs could carry him as the spider gained ground, just behind him, hissing and spitting all the while.

As he ran, the giant pencil bounced out from his pocket and went spiraling through the air. Without thinking, Juice reached back and grabbed it on instinct. As he pulled the pencil back to him, something was left behind in the air, trailing from the pencil's tip. Juice didn't give it a second thought before continuing his sprint, which was quickly stopped once more as his foot got hooked in a stuck-up root of a tree, bringing him cascading to the ground with a splitting pain in his ankle. Juice's shock and confusion only continued to spike as the red line that had been drawn through the air suddenly caught the giant spider by the legs. It tripped over the line like a wire and tumbled to the ground, it's fangs inches from Juice as it thrashed about, trying to stand up. Close to hyperventilating at this point, Juice tried to tug his foot from the root's grasp while also trying to kick away the spider with his other foot.

" _Heads up, ugly!"_ A sudden voice called from behind. Juice's eye went wide as somebody bounded from behind Juice, landing square on the spider's back and shoving something long and sharp into it. The spider let out a disgusting, squelching hiss before falling limp on the ground. "Oh gross, gross, _gross._ " The newcomer, silhouetted by the light, whimpered, completing canceling out whatever heroic action they had just done. With an equally disgusting, squelching noise, they pulled out what appeared to be a slime-covered _umbrella_ from the spider's back. 

Juice, about to pass out from the sheer amount of overwhelming pain and shock of the situation, collapsed completely, breathing heavily as the figure jumped down and approached him. "Thank...You..." Juice managed to wheeze out as the figure leaned over him.

"Uh, not a problem...Are you okay?" The figure squatted down to get a better look at Juice's situation on the ground. Long ears bent over Juice, blocking the blinding light from his eyes so that he could get a look at his umbrella-wielding savior. It was a rabbit, a very concerned looking one at that. They were wearing a pair of rectangular glasses, and underneath, a dark pattern around their eyes that also resembled the same glasses. Their fur was a light brown except for the starch white on their face, hands, inner ears, and feet, from what Juice could see. They wore a casual suit attire, a loosely worn blazer with no undershirt and some casual slacks, both in a black and dark green combo that matched with the grass. "That thing didn't nip at you, did it?"

"...No?" Juice said, sitting up to try and steady their breathing. "I think I twisted my ankle, though." Juice winced as he tried to pull his foot out again. Yup, something was certainly not right down there. "I'm also, uh, kinda having a crisis, I think?" He said with a laugh that was so unnatural and out of place that the rabbit cringed.

"Alright...Well, let's see if I can do anything about this foot." The rabbit said, gingerly untying the root and nudging Juice's foot out. Once it was free, Juice tried to move it again, but it only hurt worse. "Yup, definitely busted up. Least it's not twisted into a pretzel or anything...Can you stand?"

Clenching his fists, Juice pushed himself up, hobbling on his hurt ankle. "Yeah..." He tested his foot out, the pain was slowly dulling. "Yeah, I think I'm good." Juice looked at the rabbit, who stood up fully, their ears slumping to either side of their head as they smiled. "Uh- Sorry to be sudden but, um, where are we?"

"Where-?" The rabbit frowned, narrowing their brown eyes at Juice, "Must'a hit your head hard there, stranger. This is Coraton, only place there is." They said, delivering the last phrase like a slogan. 

Great, Juice pressed his palms against his eye, lost and alone in a place he's never heard of where the trees are green in the middle of autumn and there are giant spiders that chase you until you twist your ankle. "Have you, uh, have you managed to see my friends anywhere? One's a grinning clown guy, one's a giant opossum, and the other is a floating shadow creature?"

The rabbit stared at him for a long while, "You... _Really_ aren't from around here, are you?" They said quietly, as though it was impossible. They leaned on the curved, wooden handle of their dark green umbrella, which was still dripping with spider goo. "Who are you?"

"Cav." Juice said with a sigh, "I'm an Axolotl, and my friends call me Juice." He paused and looked up at the rabbit, who was only slightly taller then Bubby, by the looks of it, "...Who're you?"

The rabbit's face split into a bright smile, "The name's Ginger T. Rabbit, charmed to meetcha, Juice!" They reached their hand up and grabbed the side of their head, and took off their ears and made a 'how-do-you-do' motion with their cap. Ginger then promptly returned their ears, which wriggled before laying flat against the back of their head.

Juice's jaw fell open, "You...Did you _actually_ just...?" Juice made the same baffling gesture with his own crown. That certainly wasn’t called on for by any plot, it couldn’t have been...

"No idea what you're talking about." Ginger said with a grin, looking down at their umbrella and wiping the gunk off on the bark of a nearby tree. "Sorry to say but I haven't seen your friends...I'll help you find them, though, if you want. I was just making my way home." The young rabbit said with a vague gesture from behind Juice. "Besides...Something tells me you're having a heck of a time, Juice."

"...Yeah. I have more then a few questions, right now." Juice said, running a hand down the side of their face as Ginger started to walk slowly forward, giving Juice time to hobble behind. "Like, uh, what in the name of _everything_ was that spider thing?! It was _huge!_ And it was trying to kill me!"

"You know...I don't really know what that thing was either." Ginger said, glancing back at the still-twitching spider corpse, "They've been popping up all over Coraton as of late, going after all the people for seemingly no good reason...I hear more than a few folks have been _taken_ by these things. And if you get bit, well...You don't wake up- People have been falling into these weird comas all across the land because of these _things._ " Ginger said in a rather bitter tone.

"Okay, right-" Even more questions, great, "Uh-Do you know anything about this thing?" He asked, showing them the pencil, "It just kinda...Showed up."

Ginger glanced over at it, "Oh! It's your gimick."

"My...What?"

"You know- Everyone's got a schtick of sorts. A little thingy that makes 'em stand out, recognizable and all that. Like my umbrella here, and your pencil." Ginger explained loosely, pointing at Juice's tool with the tip of their umbrella, "Like...You see it do anything out of the ordinary or whatnot?"

Juice frowned down at it, "It...Made a physical line, in the air. Like a drew on the air like..." Juice paused, Ginger stopped moving to watch Juice, frowning curiously. Juice lifted the pencil into the air and then, as though ripping a Band-Aid off, made a sharp, downwards motion in the air. What was left behind was another thin, red line, hovering in the air in front of him. Letting out a chuckle of disbelief, Juice slowly reached forward his other hand and grabbed the line. It was solid, it was really _there_ , this wasn't some concussion induced lucid dream after all...

"You draw anything else except for lines?" Ginger asked with a snicker, to which Juice rolled his eye.

This was real, so...Might as well start small. Hunching down, Juice started scribbling in the air, still baffled by what was happening before his eyes. When he stood back up, a simple flower was now sticking from the ground. A strange, red, 2-D flower. Ginger was still watching, as if they were expecting something else to happen. Feeling a bit self-concious, Juice reached down and prodded one of the petals of the flower, as if urging it to do a trick. To Juice's surprise, the flower sprang to life, suddenly flowing in the breeze and amazingly alive and organic under Juice's finger.

Ginger stooped down and plucked the flower, examining it. "That...Is _amazing."_ Ginger said with wide eyes, "I mean, look, I know I've been trying to act all cool or whatever, this is honestly pretty awesome." Ginger said with an excited grin. Without seeming to realize they were doing it, Ginger's foot started to tap on the ground. It started to speed up until, amazingly, their foot became a blur. Their eyes suddenly went wide behind their spectacles and they gave their foot a final slam on the ground. Ginger went flying upwards towards the treetops. In a flash, they opened their umbrella and became weightless in the air, floating back to the ground with a look as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened. "You know..." Ginger said, handing Juice their strange flower, "I think I _did_ overhear something in the town about some new, strange person in the next town over. And considering we aren't a place known for new people...I'm betting it was one of your friends."

" _Really?!_ Could you help me find them, if you can, please?" Juice might have sounded desperate, but in a strange and unmistakably cartoony world, it might be helpful to gain a cartoony ally.

Ginger couldn't suppress the grin on their face. "If you're as interesting and important as I think you are, then I'll be helping you to my dying breath, Juice Axolotl."


End file.
